


Live-In Skin

by flawedamythyst



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Season/Series 03, Sharing a Body
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-11-29
Updated: 2008-10-22
Packaged: 2018-10-15 19:11:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 14,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10556228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flawedamythyst/pseuds/flawedamythyst
Summary: Sam comes up with a radical way to save Dean from his deal.





	1. I'll Keep You Safe Inside Me

So, the thing is, there really is no way to break a deal with a demon without consequences that even Sam isn't willing to consider. Sam has had to accept that and move on, looking at new areas of research, about souls and hell and the way demons get one into the other. It isn't until the fourteenth time that he reads _demons can't touch a soul while it still has a body protecting it_ that he really understands what it means.

The demon can't touch Dean while he has a body wrapped around him, which is where the hellhounds come in - a body can't contain a soul when it's broken and bleeding. There's no way Sam can stop Dean's soul escaping his body when they kill him, but in the split second before the demon gathers it up and takes it down to hell, he might be able to put it somewhere else, protect it with another body.

Well, that's the theory, anyway. The practical application involves a large, empty warehouse, knocking Dean out and tying him to a chair because there's no way he's going to go along with this willingly, an incredibly complex ancient Etruscan ritual that Sam is only ninety percent sure isn't going to turn them both into camels and - the worst bit - watching Dean get torn apart by the invisible hellhounds before he can even start.

It all happens at once after that - Sam says the last word of the ritual and drops to his knees with the sudden, burning pain in his head, the demon turns up to find out what's taking so long, and Dean wakes up with a yell of pain that reverberates around Sam's skull.

There's no time to explain anything to Dean, not right now, so Sam just pushes him down with all the force his mind can muster, hissing at him to _shut up, shut up, stay still, don't do anything_ at the same time as he pulls himself off the ground and levels the Colt at the demon, wishing his hand wasn't shaking.

The demon is frowning at them, head tipped to one side as if not sure what it is seeing. "Oh, very clever," it says eventually, almost admiringly. "It's been a long time since I've seen that one tried - even longer since I've seen it work." It steps forward, and Sam can see the hellhounds now, gathering behind the demon menacingly and glaring with red eyes at Sam. "Of course, there's nothing to stop me tearing you apart as well."

Sam grins, and cocks the Colt. "Just try it," he threatens, and shoots a hellhound in the dead centre of its forehead. The bullet hole flickers blue for a second before the hound slumps to the ground.

 _What the hell did you do, Sam?_ he hears in the back of his mind, but he doesn't break concentration, keeps his eyes firmly on the demon as it glances back at its dead pet then frowns. Sam edges back slightly, trying to get his back against the warehouse wall before the demon realises what he's doing. The demon growls and steps forward with murderous intent.

"Kill them," it growls at the hellhounds, and they all surge forward as a pack. Sam shoots two before they reach them, backing up as fast as he can and desperately hoping he'll be fast enough to get them all. He shoots the third as it's already in the air, leaping at them with wide, gaping jaws, and its corpse falls on them, knocking them to the ground. Sam is momentarily dazed, and Dean just takes over, raises the Colt and shoots the last hound before it can get close enough to rip into them.

"What's going on?" he growls, and it's so strange to have someone else speaking through his mouth that for a moment Sam can only blink with shock. It's his voice, but he can hear Dean's intonations shifting vowels and consonants into unfamiliar patterns. Dean pushes the dead hellhound off them while Sam's still reeling, and they stand up slightly clumsily.

The demon laughs. "You didn't tell him what you were planning? Don't you think that's a little rude?"

 _He wouldn't have agreed,_ thinks Sam. _He wouldn't have risked it._

 _Risked what?_ asks Dean's voice, impatient and slightly belligerent, and Sam has to blink back surprise again, because of course Dean can hear his mind now. He's in his mind, after all.

"You had to have a body protecting you," he says out loud. "To stop him taking your soul."

"So you put me in yours?" asks Dean incredulously, hijacking Sam's vocal chords again. _Our vocal chords_ Sam reminds himself. _It's our body now._

"Oh, man," says the demon, walking towards them, "I almost want to leave you alive just to see how long it takes before you both go mad, but you guys still owe me, and fun as this is, I think it's time to collect payment." He tries to step forward again, then frowns when his progress is suddenly halted.

Sam smirks, and he can feel Dean in it, curving their lip slightly differently and twitching an eyebrow. "You really think it was going to be that easy?" he asks, and then twitches his eyes up at the warehouse ceiling, high above them, where he'd spent hours last night crawling around on narrow wooden joists, pulling a pot of black paint behind him as he tried to talk himself out of this plan.

The demon grits his teeth, but Sam is already reeling off an exorcism, Dean prompting him when his memory falters on the Latin. The demon roars away in a cloud of smoke, leaving a confused man blinking at them and glancing around at the warehouse with wide eyes.

Sam slumps to his, no, to their knees and barely notices when the man runs away. Dean is silent for a moment, and Sam can feel his emotions churning somewhere in the back of their mind, and tries not to listen in as Dean flips through anger, relief, and a horrible, weary moment of _it's still not over._ Dean always plays close to his chest with his feelings and Sam wants to give him privacy to sort through this.

 _Never going to have any privacy again_ , points out Dean angrily. _Neither of us are._

"You really think you'd have had privacy in Hell?" asks Sam out loud, trying to allow himself the illusion that Dean can't hear every little thing that flips through his head. He hadn't realised when he did the spell just how it would work, and having Dean's consciousness right there, nestled against his, is going to take some getting used to.

He ignores Dean's grumbling response to that and staggers to his feet, heading over to the chair on the other side of the room which still holds Dean's limp body as it hangs from the ropes binding it. Dean's mind falls silent when he takes in what they're seeing, and all Sam can feel from him is a numb kind of shock. He wonders what it's like to see your own corpse from the outside.

"It sucks," says Dean, with feeling. Sam sees an image of the shapeshifter who'd stolen Dean's form, blood flowing freely from a bullet hole, flick past his mind quicker than lightning. _Not the first time,_ he thinks.

Dean has taken over control of all their body now, lurching slightly as he tries to move the unfamiliar limbs in his usual, bow-legged walk. He crouches unsteadily down beside his own body and just stares. Their hand moves forward and hovers for a moment over his shoulder, and Sam's not sure which of them is controlling it. It drops again without touching Dean.

The hellhounds tore into Dean with fierce savagery, and there's blood streaked all down his ripped clothing. Sam can see bone through a wound on his chest.

"If we burn it," says Dean, Sam's voice sounding unnaturally gruff, "Am I going to...go? Like spirits do?"

Sam shakes their head. "No," he says softly. "I've bound you to this body now. It's...your soul isn't connected to that one anymore."

Dean clenches their fist and thumps it hard on to their thigh. Sam can feel his anger boiling over. "Goddamnit, Sam, what were you thinking? What...what happens to me now?"

Sam shrugs. He's not going to apologise for this, especially not when he can still feel relief under-pining Dean's anger, and catches the tail end of _God, he actually managed it_ , whispered with pride. "You're stuck now. You can't leave this body without some serious mojo, or it dying. Same as me." _Neither of us are getting left behind now_.

He can feel his brow wrinkle into Dean's 'trying to get my head round this' face, and he wonders what it looks like, wants to see his brother's expressions on his face. "So we...this is it? We're spending the rest of your life like this?"

"Our life," says Sam, firmly. He looks back down at Dean's dead body, then carefully shuts his sightless eyes. "Let's burn it," he adds.

Dean's body burns with a bright flame. As they watch it, Sam can feel Dean still struggling with this, trying to wrap his head around it and largely failing. Sam's not worried though, can't even bring himself to mourn Dean's body the way he can feel part of Dean is.

He'd been so worried he'd be doing this alone, watching Dean go up in smoke with no one beside him and wondering how he could function in a world without Dean, but he's not. He's never going to be alone again, and as fucked up and twisted as this is, with all the problems and arguments he can feel coming up, that's all that matters to him. Dean is safe and protected, and Sam can feel a year of worry and fear just melting away, coiling gently towards the sky with the smoke of the pyre.


	2. I Must Live In Skin That's New

 

 

That first night, after they've burnt Dean's body, there's not enough energy left in either of them to think about the bigger picture, the larger ramifications of what Sam has done. They wait until Dean's body is nothing but smoking ashes, then gather up everything that might clue the cops in that they'd been there before heading back out to the car. Dean's finding everything horribly strange - being in a body that he's not controlling, being in a body that's taller than he's expecting, having Sam right there and thinking Sam thoughts that Dean's only been able to guess at before now.

Sam dumps the stuff in the trunk, then pauses awkwardly. "Do you...do you want to drive?" he asks, and Dean's not sure why he's saying it out loud, because he'd already felt Sam's indecision before he said anything.

He really wants to drive though, so he carefully takes over control of Sam's body again. He almost bangs Sam's head getting into the car, and has to take a moment to get his bearings once they're seated. He's known this car his entire life, he's driven it all over the country, through snow, rain and demonic storms, it's the closest thing he'll probably ever have to a home, but now it feels strange and unfamiliar. He doesn't fit behind the wheel as perfectly as he did in his own body. Sam's elbow knocks against the door when he turns the key in the ignition, and when he glances up automatically to where the mirror should be, it's actually several inches below that. He grits Sam's teeth and carefully pulls away. Nothing's going to stop him driving his baby, and he'll get used to the differences soon enough, he hopes.

They get back to the motel in one piece, and Dean's starting to think he might be able to get used to this new body, get used to the different ways it bends and the overall stupid largeness of it. It's hard not to miss his own body though, remember all the ways he knew exactly how to use it to best effect. It's hard to think that it's gone forever - this still seems temporary. Just another whacked out thing that hunting has caused and that they'll fix soon enough, but there's no way to fix this.

He lets Sam take over again when they get inside the room, but Sam doesn't seem to know what to do. He just slumps down on the nearest bed and they stare at the ceiling for a while.

"I'm not going to apologise," says Sam eventually.

Dean snorts, but it sounds strange in Sam's body - the wrong pitch and too nasal. "Yeah, I got that," he replies.

They lie there a bit longer, but Dean can feel Sam waiting, waiting for Dean to do something, say something.

"It's kinda late," he says eventually. "You going to go to bed? You feel kinda tired."

"WE feel kinda tired," says Sam, firmly. "This is your body too now." He hesitates and again Dean's not sure why, cos he can feel what's about to come out of his mouth, surging about in his mind like a maelstrom. "I know it's weird, and you...you don't fit here like you did in your own body, but...this is both of us now. I don't...I can't treat you just like a passenger, or a guest. We're both entitled to this - we're going to have to share."

Dean thinks about that for a long time, and he can feel Sam watching the shape of his thoughts as he does so, which really pisses him off. There's nothing to do be done about it though, no way to shut Sam out any more, so he tries to ignore it. In the end, though, he can only really come to one conclusion. "I'm tired, you're tired, the body's tired. I sure as shit ain't going to pee in it, so you're going to get ready for bed, and then we're going to sleep. The rest can wait."

Sam laughs, and it sounds different from the inside. Quieter, somehow, and deeper. He pulls them tiredly to their feet, and heads for the bathroom.

 

****

 

Naturally, in the morning there are other things to worry about, like the fact that Sam's body seems to just wake up all in one go along with his mind, while Dean's left lagging behind, not used to mornings that don't start with a gentle warm-up. Sam showers them, and gets them dressed - although Dean vetoes a few shirts before letting Sam pull one on. Being seen with Sam while he's wearing them is one thing, being seen wearing them himself is a totally different one. He's going to have to chuck out half Sam's wardrobe and buy new stuff, he decides.

He wakes up enough to make Sam grab his leather jacket before they leave to find breakfast though, and throws it on over Sam's broad shoulders, ignoring the way it pulls tight around them. He can feel Sam's quiet amusement lapping against his mind, but ignores it in favour of concentrating on walking without misjudging their steps, or lurching.

"You've had a lifetime to practice moving in this body," he points out, "It's only fair I get some time to catch up." It's only when he notices a small child is staring at him that he realises that he is, essentially, talking to himself, and he purses Sam's lips, _our lips, Dean,_ and keeps quiet for the rest of the walk.

 

****

 

The day slips by in a welter of practical considerations - sorting through Dean's stuff and throwing away most of his clothes, sorting through Sam's stuff and throwing away all the stuff Dean never wants to be seen wearing, trying to work out who gets the final decision on what they eat for lunch - and then they're collapsing into bed again and they haven't talked about it at all. The next day goes the same way, and the one after it. They go out to a field outside town and Dean practises moving in Sam's body - running without tripping over the several inches of leg he's not expecting, firing the the guns and hitting what he's aiming for rather than several inches above it. He tries to work out what it would be like to fight in this body, but there's no one to spar against, and he just can't get the feel for how he can use Sam's stupidly-long limbs to his advantage.

And then a week has passed, and they need to move on to a different town, because the FBI are still after them and sometimes it pays to be cautious. They spot a newspaper headline in a diner, and just like that they have a hunt and a destination, and everything else just gets shoved away while they cope with an angry spirit killing little girls, and try to work out how to hunt while they're sharing the same body. It's not that hard, really - Sam still does the research, and Dean is still the one to set fire to the corpse, and the only difference is that the other one is right there, in the same headspace, watching and making snarky comments ( _Dean_ ) and annoying suggestions ( _Sam_ ).

It's not that Dean isn't angry, because he is, he's absolutely furious that Sam did this to them without asking him and that he thinks that this isn't going to end badly. He just finds it hard to be as angry as he should be when he can feel how relieved Sam is, when sometimes he can almost taste how much his brother cares about him, and how happy he is that Dean's not dead. Besides, there's so much else to think about and cope with that anger has to take a back seat.

Being able to read each other's minds all the time, to see all the random thoughts and images that flash through each other's minds takes a lot of getting used to. They're both pretending as much as they can that they can't - they use Sam's vocal chords to talk to each other, as if they don't know what's going to be said before it comes out, and they both work hard not to respond to casual thoughts or to mention emotions that they know the other doesn't want to talk about.

This thing that Sam's done to them is the most obvious of the Things We Don't Mention. Sam never acknowledges that he knows how angry Dean is about it or that he wishes Sam could just have let him go, even though Dean can feel Sam's violent emotional reaction whenever that thought crosses Dean's mind. In turn, Dean tries not to pay attention to how pleased Sam is that it worked, that he didn't fuck it up and let Dean die, or turn them both into camels. (This thought always serves to make Dean's rage burn even brighter, because what the hell was Sammy thinking, to mess with something like this when he wasn't even completely sure what the spell did?)

Dean even tries not to notice when Sam has a brief flash of regret. That only happens when it's late, and they're both exhausted and pissed off and just want to not be around each other any more. Sam's always horribly guilty a moment afterwards, and sometimes even a little sick. _If he wasn't here, he'd be in Hell,_ Dean catches once or twice, as if Sam's reminding himself. Dean suppresses his response to that, but sometimes can't stop himself wondering if this might not turn out to be hell after all.

 _I almost want to leave you alive just to see how long it takes before you both go mad,_ the demon had said, and sometimes Dean can feel it, feel everything just welling up inside him as he tries to keep away everything he doesn't want Sam to see. No amount of control over Sam's body ( _our body_ , except Dean is still finding it hard to identify a body he's spent years knowing from the outside as his) can keep him from feeling as if everything he is is just slowly seeping away, twisting itself around until it's all confused and he's occasionally not sure where he ends and Sam begins.

Sam can sense what Dean's thinking, of course, and once or twice Dean catches him worrying about the same thing, but there's nothing that can be done, so they just keep hunting, the same as they always have, and trying to pretend everything is normal. Dean can't help over-hearing Sam thinking that that's never worked for them before, but he's prepared to ignore that as well.

 

****

 

 

Which works fine, right up until Bobby phones them. He's been calling on and off since the day of Dean's deal, but they've just been ignoring it. Sam knows he's going to get yelled at if Bobby finds out, and Dean doesn't want to be...to be exorcised or something, because, yeah, sharing his brother's body like some kind of parasite is shit, but he's pretty sure the alternative sucks much, much worse.

This time, though, they're still asleep when the phone rings, wrung out after a fight with a spirit that just would not stay down, and bruised all down their left side where it threw them into a wall. Sam's consciousness wakes up first, and he fumbles for the phone without even thinking, just wanting to stop the noise.

"Yeah?" he groans out.

"Sam?" comes Bobby's surprised voice. "You want to tell me what the hell's been going on?" He sounds pissed, and that's enough to jerk Dean awake as well.

"Bobby," says Sam, and Dean can feel him panicking. _Oh god, oh god, what do I say, what do I say?_

"What do you mean?" steps in Dean, trying to make himself sound like Sam.

There's a disbelieving, exasperated noise on the other end of the phone. "What do I mean?! Sam, it's been a month since Dean's deal came up, and no one's heard anything from you. We've been worried sick."

"Oh, right," says Sam as Dean blinks and tries to process that. _Has it really been a month already?_ "No need to worry, we're fine." The 'we' is instinctive now and Dean winces at it, knowing that Bobby will pick up on it immediately.

Sure enough, "We?" says Bobby, hope tinging his voice. "Dean's there? He's okay?"

"Uh," says Sam, sitting up and rubbing at their eyes. "Kinda."

There's a loud silence from Bobby that speaks louder than words. "Sam...what happened?"

Sam's silent, and Dean can feel all the possible answers flickering through his mind. "I had to...there was..." he starts, but Dean can feel he doesn't know how to end the sentence and steps in again. "We've been through a bit of a change."

Bobby's silent for a long moment, and when he speaks again, his voice is a stern command. "You boys come up and see me immediately."

"Yes sir," replies Dean, automatically responding to the order.

"Right," says Bobby, "Be here soon." He hangs up before either of them can reply, and Sam drops the phone and collapses back on to the bed.

"We're so screwed," he says. Dean can only agree.

 


	3. Facing The Music

Bobby comes out onto the porch when he hears the Impala's engine turning into his driveway. He can only see one figure inside, which makes the worry that he's been suppressing since the day of Dean's deal came and went without a word from the boys regain all the strength it had lost after his phone call to Sam.

"Where's Dean?" he asks as soon as Sam gets out of the car, unwillingly to waste time with greetings and platitudes.

"Right here," replies Sam, and his voice somehow doesn't sound right - deeper than usual. He's walking strange as well - less hunched-over than usual, as if he's lost the self-conscious need to down-play his height. Bobby resolves to slip him some holy water as soon as possible.

"Where?" asks Bobby, glancing around the deserted yard.

Sam gives a little shrug and buries his hands in his pockets in a manner that Bobby instantly recognises as _I'm about to be yelled at for something I know was a stupid thing to do_. The movement is a hundred percent Sam, so maybe there's no need for Bobby to be plotting the fastest way to get holy water into him after all.

"He's here," says Sam, "He's just...things are a bit different now. Can we explain inside? We'll drink all the holy water you want us to, but it's kinda cold out here."

Bobby narrows his eyes. "We?" he repeats, picking up on the bit of Sam's speech that didn't sound right.

Sam snorts, and it's both completely wrong from him, and sickeningly familiar.

"Everything's 'we' now," he says, speaking in that strange, off-putting rhythm again, but this time Bobby recognises it, puts two and two together and feels his eyes widen with shock. "Dean?" he chokes out.

"Yeah," says Sam with Dean's vocal pattern. "Can we get that holy water in something stronger than beer? I think we're all gonna need it."

"You might," he says a moment later, sounding like Sam again, "Not all of us need to use alcohol as a crutch."

"Jesus Christ," breathes Bobby in disbelief. "What did you do?"

Sam clenches his jaw and says in a firm, stubborn tone that Bobby recognises from a million childhood battles with his father, "I saved my brother from Hell."

 

****

 

Bobby gives them the holy water with a shot of whisky. He's pretty sure that there's nothing demonic about this fucked up mess, but it never hurts to be sure. It gets shot back in one gulp, followed by the whisky, and held out for a refill. Bobby takes that to mean Dean's in charge, but it's Sam who explains what happened, words tumbling out in his usual, slightly confused ramble. Bobby sends him...them out to the Impala to get a copy of the spell Sam had used, and he can see from the faint swagger and the occasional unsteadiness that it's Dean who walks out to the car.

They come back and Bobby takes the book from them, but doesn't look at it immediately. He's too busy squinting at them, trying to see the differences between when Sam is there and when Dean is.

"You boys," he says eventually, then shakes his head, unable to find words to fully describe the stupidity of this. "Every time I think you Winchesters can't do anything crazier, you manage to out do yourselves. This is...this is ludicrous."

"Hey!" They exclaim, and Bobby knows that particular note of wounded innocence has to be Dean. He never could pull it off. "I had nothing to do with this. He just sprung it on me without asking."

"Because I knew you'd say no," replies Sam, tiredly, "And I wasn't just going to let you go to Hell for me." Watching them bicker at each other exactly the same way they always have but from behind the same face is giving Bobby a headache.

"You boys just sit down, keep quiet, and try not to do anything else incredibly stupid while I look at this book."

"Yes, sir," they say, and Bobby has no idea which of them says it, then they slump down on the sofa, turn the TV on and have a muttered argument over what to watch. Bobby sits down at his desk and resists the temptation to throw some of his ancient tomes at them. Books should be treated with respect, after all.

 

****

 

An hour later, and he's beginning to think it might be worth denting a few books just to get them to shut up.

"Dean, if we try and sit like that, we're gonna fall off the sofa."

"For some reason the couch is smaller than I remember it, Sasquatch."

"You'd think you'd be grateful not to be a midget anymore."

Bobby slams the book shut with a bang and they look up with a start.

"Well, frankly, you're both damned lucky you're not camels," he says, in lieu of throwing anything valuable at them.

Their head falls back against the sofa. "Christ on a stick, Sammy, remind me to never let you near a spell book again."

Bobby glares at them and they fall silent. "As far as I can see, you're right that this is permanent. Souls are tricky things, and they don't like being messed about with."

"Maybe you should have told Sam that before he got the genius idea to do this to us," gripes Dean.

"I did," growls Bobby, but neither of them are listening.

"Maybe he should have told you that before you sold yours to a demon!"

"Well, maybe if you hadn't died in the first place..."

"BOYS!" yells Bobby, his patience at its limit. "Will you just stop bickering for five minutes? Jesus."

They have the grace to look chagrined. "Sorry, Bobby," says Dean, and Sam repeats it a moment later, with an extra layer of sulkiness. Bobby rubs a hand over his face and wonders if it was an element of the spell to regress them to their teenage years, or if it's just their natural state.

 

****

 

He makes them lunch, and they argue about how much ketchup they want, and about whether or not they're going to eat their vegetables (Bobby ends that one with a growl of 'I've cooked it, so you'll damn well eat it' which shuts them up pretty fast.) By the time it's over, Bobby's head is throbbing and the reality of the situation is beginning to sink in.

"Boys," he says, slowly, "Are you sure you're gonna be able to cope with this?"

They shrug. "Don't have much choice," they say in Dean's most self-defeated tone. A moment later, a flinch crosses Sam's face, and Bobby's willing to bet that's Sam's reaction to whatever Dean was thinking.

That thought makes something else occur to him, and he hesitates a moment before asking, "How close are you in there? I mean...can you...do you get any privacy?"

Sam's eyes flick down to the table, and it's still all Dean's usual attempts at avoiding emotional moments as they admit, "Not really. It's...we're pretty close." It's just typical that Dean's the one answering the difficult questions, facing up to the music, when it was Sam's fault to start with.

Bobby shakes his head. "You're gonna have to play this real careful," he points out, "Or you're going to lose hold on your sanity." After just a few hours in their presence, he's beginning to lose it himself. He can only imagine how much worse it is to be stuck like that, sharing everything with someone else and unable to pull away.

They just nod, still not meeting his eyes, and he sighs. "Well, call me if you need anything," he says, and they take it as the dismissal he meant it to be, standing up and heading for the door.

They pause for a moment before they leave though, one hand on the door. "Bobby," they say quietly, and Bobby can tell from the quiet vulnerability and the refusal to turn around and look at him that it's probably Dean. "When...when Sam dies...am I gonna go to Hell anyway?"

Bobby says nothing for a moment, and that's enough to get Dean moving again, turning the door knob. "I don't know," says Bobby, before they can escape outside. "I don't know for sure how these things work. If the demon with the contract is dead, and no other one steps up, maybe you'll just...just go along with Sam." There's a silence as they all hear what he's not saying. _And maybe another demon will claim you, or you'll just go there automatically._

They nod tersely and leave, the Impala engine revving away a few minutes later. Bobby takes a deep breath, and pours himself a strong drink. He's got to phone Ellen and somehow explain all this to her, but first, he just wants to take a moment and get used to this new state of affairs.

"Jesus Christ," he mutters to himself. "Lord save me from goddamn Winchesters and their hare-brained schemes." He downs the drink, takes a deep breath in preparation, and picks up the phone. _This ain't gonna be fun._

 


	4. All Our Lines Are Blurring

 

During the first few months, they have to reach compromises in almost every area of their life. They negotiate a complex system of who gets control when, which reminds them both of being kids. Dad had been strict about sticking to sharing everything as exactly as possible, in order to avoid fights that usually ended with, "Because I'm older!" or "It's not fair! I hate you!".

Where once they'd divided up candy into exact halves, now they stick carefully to being in control for a day at a time, although it doesn't take long before there are all kinds of conditions and amendments tacked onto the agreement - Sam gets to take charge of any internet research they need to do, Dean gets to watch TV if Godzilla's on and they both take part in interviewing witnesses. Sam tends to take control in the early mornings, until Dean's mind has had a chance to wake up enough to catch up with their body.

Whether they introduce themselves as Sam or Dean changes from town to town, depending entirely on who manages to gain control of their vocal chords at the right moment. For a long time it's a game, an easy way to piss the other off, until one of them thinks that it doesn't matter what name they use because no one's going to remember them in a few weeks anyway. Sam's not sure which of them the thought originated from, but after that the fun goes out of the game, although they still go through the motions. They do a lot of going through the motions now, trying to keep everything as close to their lives before as possible.

Sex is the most difficult thing they have to deal with in the early months - neither of them feel at all comfortable knowing that the other can read every flash of fantasy that runs through their thoughts, but the reality is that their body is young and male, with all the hormones and needs that that implies.

It's nearly two weeks after the ritual that Dean brings it up. They're channel hopping, and flick past a sex scene. They haven't jerked off since the deal came due, and their body is beginning to feel seriously frustrated, so much so that the brief flash of bare breasts is enough to send blood rushing south.

Dean clears their throat. "If you don't spank the monkey soon, we're not gonna be fit for polite company."

For once Sam doesn't argue that Dean should say 'we.' The idea of them both jacking off together is enough to wither any hint of horniness. "Don't you think that'll be a bit fucked up, even for us?" he says out loud.

Dean shrugs. "Got to be done sooner or later. You know it ain't healthy not to." There's a flash of _God, I miss my dick,_ that Sam ignores.

"You want me just to pull it out now, and go for it?" he asks sarcastically instead. "That wouldn't make you at all uncomfortable?"

He can tell that just the idea of it does, but he can feel Dean's stubbornness as well. "Why not? It's that or never do it again, and even you ain't monk enough for that." _I'm certainly not,_ follows fast on the heels of that, and Sam sighs, defeated by Dean's frustration more than his words.

"Fine," he says, "But you're not allowed to get weird about this." There's a mental snort as he takes a deep breath and reaches down to undo their jeans.

He can feel Dean mentally backing off as much as possible, trying to leave Sam to it and blank out all his thoughts so that Sam can pretend he's alone in his head. It doesn't work. Sam can still feel Dean reacting to the grip of their hand around their cock, and is completely aware of the images that it brings to Dean's head - freeze frames of women that Sam half-remembers from diners and bars. He can feel Dean's arousal burning through their body along with Sam's as he starts to pump and he shuts their eyes as if he can still block him out. They come quickly, and he can feel Dean's surge of elation at the physical high almost as strongly as he can feel his own. It adds a sick twist of shame and guilt to the afterglow.

By unspoken agreement, they don't talk about it again, or even think about it too clearly. Two mornings later, Dean takes a firm grip on their cock in the shower and Sam takes his turn trying to hide his mind away, but he has about the same level of success as Dean did. He just can't stop thinking, especially not with endorphins surging through their blood and pleasure running down their spine.

 _This is definitely the weirdest thing we've ever done,_ thinks Dean, and Sam has to agree, although he doesn't say anything, just lets Dean finish their shower and wash their come down the drain.

After that, it becomes part of their routine, just another of the compromises that they try not to think about. They both try to pretend that this is something they leave the other alone with, but it's not long before Dean knows all Sam's favourite fantasies and Sam becomes familiar with the one-night-stands that Dean remembers most clearly.

 

****

 

When they go to a bar, it's usually on one of Dean's days, although they go less often now than he used to before the deal came due. It's hard to relax with a beer when you have to remember not to start talking to yourself, but they've got both the demon and Bobby's words still running through their head and they know that they're running close to the edge of insanity. Going out and having a drink, pretending that they still have a toe-hold on normal, is a way to try and keep themselves sane.

Dean takes to chatting to the strangers who sit next to them at the bar. Sam leaves him to it and tries to ignore how often it's a woman in a low-cut top that Dean introduces himself to.

This time she's blonde and called Bonnie. Sam doesn't need to hear Dean's thoughts to know that she's a sure thing. She's giving them every signal in the book - fussing with her hair, smiling up into their eyes, reaching out to touch their arm. Sam stays as quiet as he can, and tries to ignore the regret he can feel welling up in Dean. _I'm never gonna get laid again,_ he can hear, echoing around his own mind long after it's gone from Dean's.

It seems so unfair that Dean should be denied this when it used to be one of the things he lived for. Sam takes a mental deep breath, and thinks, clearly, _You can, if you want to. I don't mind._

Dean isn't shocked, really - neither of them are ever shocked by the other now, not when they can read every thought as it's forming, but he is dubious. _You sure?_

 _Yeah_ , thinks Sam. After all, he did this so that Dean could keep on living, right? And Dean's list of the best bits of life has always included sex. Dean spends a minute mulling it over, but it only takes another giggled comment from Bonnie, and an unsubtle display of her cleavage as she bends to pick up her bag, and his mind is made up.

 _Can't be much weirder than jerking off,_ he thinks, the moment before he offers Bonnie a flirtatious grin that Sam thinks probably doesn't work the same on his face as it used to on Dean's, and asks her if she wants to go back to his motel room.

 

****

 

Bonnie's lipgloss tastes faintly of artificial strawberries, and her hair feels dry beneath their fingers, frazzled by peroxide. Sam can't help himself from remembering how soft Jess's hair had been. Her skin's smooth though, and when Dean slides one of their hands under her top and up to her breasts, she gasps into their mouth, and her hips writhe against theirs in a way that makes Sam want to just push her back against the wall and thrust against her.

This is Dean's show though, and Sam's meant to be pretending he's not there. He takes a mental deep breath, and tries to clear his mind of how much he just wants to get her onto the bed so he can suck and bite at her neck until they've left a mark.

 _That's a good idea_ , he hears float through Dean's mind, and he does exactly what Sam had been picturing, shoving their knee between Bonnie's legs as he lies her down on the bed, then nipping along her collarbone after leaving a dark hickey right where everyone will see it tomorrow.

Dean strips off her top so that he can trail their mouth further down, and lifts her up slightly so that they can reach the catch on the back of her bra. He fumbles for a couple of long moments, and irritation shoots through him. _Damn fingers are too big_ , Sam hears, accompanied by a million images of Dean doing this with far more ease, back when he was in his own body.

 _Let me,_ he thinks, and takes temporary control of their hand just long enough to flick her bra open, before he retreats back behind the lie of not being there.

 _Seems like we're doing this together_ , thinks Dean, but he's more amused than freaked out. Sam takes that as a sign that living as they are has fucked them up beyond all recall, but can't bring himself to care when Dean's bending their head to take Bonnie's nipple in their mouth, rolling their tongue around it in a way that makes her moan.

Dean sheds their clothes and strips Bonnie of hers, dragging her damp underwear down her legs before sliding down her body to bury their tongue inside her, licking out all her sweet slickness.

 _No way I'm gonna fumble this,_ Dean thinks with a sense of pride at his prowess, and Sam has to agree. Dean's got tricks Sam never even knew existed, flicking his tongue until Bonnie's shaking with need and begging incoherently. For a brief moment Sam thinks that maybe he should be taking notes, before he remembers that he's never going to be doing this without Dean, and there's no point.

 _Doing this together_ , he thinks, and reaches up with their hand to thumb across her nipple. Dean doesn't object, and Sam can feel a faint air of approval.

 _Drive her crazy before we fuck her._ It sounds like something Dean would think, but Sam's not a hundred percent sure it didn't come from him. It doesn't really matter either way - they both agree with it.

 

****

 

Afterwards, Bonnie doesn't bother putting her underwear back on, just shoves it into her bag as she leaves, giving them a satisfied smile.

Sam feels like they should shower, but Dean can't be bothered to move and Sam doesn't want to raise the energy to insist. They lie awake for a while, both of them carefully not thinking about it. It's too impossible for either of them to hide how little they're freaking out about it, though, and as they slide closer to sleep, Sam hears Dean remembering Bobby's words, _How close are you in there?_

 _Man, he had no idea,_ he thinks, and he feels Dean's agreement as they fall asleep.

 


	5. I Will Not Change Back For You

 

 

Bobby calls them while they're in a bar in Kentucky, sharing a beer and arguing in their head over whether they should have another one, or go back to the motel for bed.

"Boys," he greets them. He'd taken to calling them that not long after the ritual, fed up with trying to work out who he was talking to at any given moment. Sam wonders what their mobile number is listed under on his phone. _Morons, probably,_ suggests Dean.

"Hey, Bobby," Sam says, leaning back on their bar stool and crossing their ankles over in a manner that would lead to them ending up in a heap on the floor if Dean tried it. He's still not quite got the hang of their body's balance. Sam's not sure he ever will - maybe you have to go through the awkward teenage years in a body in order to get some kind of grace in it. _Show off,_ Dean snarks grumpily.

"You boys working on anything?" asks Bobby, dispensing with unnecessary small talk. Dean approves of cutting right to the chase, but Sam wishes they could go through at least a semblance of normal social formalities. It's not as if they've got much normal left, anymore.

Dean rolls their eyes at him, and answers Bobby. "Nope, we're all done here. It's all over except the victory drinking."

"There's a bunch of missing cavers near Greenville, Colorado. Thing is, they had a bad mine collapse a few decades ago, and not all the bodies were found."

They groan at that, and it's one of the increasingly common moments when Sam's not sure who has charge of their body. "So, we're going to be crawling through tunnels and hunting for ancient corpses?" he clarifies.

"Yeah," says Bobby, and they can both hear the grin in his voice. "I'd go myself, but I'm not getting any younger, and you know what my back's like."

"Bullshit," grumbles Dean. "You just don't want to spend hours wandering around in the dark, dragging a pick axe." Sam can tell most of his reluctance is faked though - he's already running lists of their supplies through his mind, working out what they need to buy. _Probably some better rope, definitely some more flashlight batteries..._

"We'll head up there tomorrow," says Sam to Bobby.

Bobby grunts his agreement. "I'll email my research over."

 _You can read through all that,_ thinks Dean, as if he'll be able to do something else while Sam's using their eyes to read. "Thanks," they say out loud, "We'll let you know how it goes."

"Okay," says Bobby, "Try not to let Dean bump your head while you're down there."

"It's not my fault I'm stuck in the body of a giant," bitches Dean. Both Sam and Bobby ignore him.

"Bye, Bobby," says Sam, then clicks off their phone. The bartender is giving them a slight, confused frown, and Sam wonders which freaky thing he's picked up from the conversation - the hunting for corpses thing, or the 'there's really two of us in here' thing. Either he thinks they're a sick fuck with an unhealthy obsession with corpses, or a schizophrenic. Or both.

In the first few months that they were sharing a body, they both spent a lot of time thinking about the demon's words: _I almost want to leave you alive just to see how long it takes before you both go mad,_ and Bobby's comment to the same effect: _You're gonna have to play this real careful, or you're going to lose hold on your sanity._

They both tried hard to keep the lines clear between them, and to have things they each did that were separate from each other. Or, as separate as they could get - just because Dean was the one talking to the cute girl in the bar, didn't mean he didn't have Sam's thoughts and opinions about her streaming past his consciousness.

It's been two years, though, and they don't think they're any closer to insanity than they were before. _You've always been a couple of clowns short of a circus, anyway,_ points out Dean, and sniggers when Sam flinches from the mental images of clowns.

They've been getting odd looks from bartenders since Sam was old enough to fake his way inside a bar though, so it's nothing new for Dean to offer the bartender a grin that clearly does nothing to reassure him and down the rest of their beer before they head back to their motel room.

 

****

 

They get lost in the mine, of course. Dean blames it on Sam's body. "I never got lost when I was in my body," he bitches, both of them talking out loud in an attempt to make the mine seem less silent and empty.

Sam ignores him. "Look, I think we went wrong here," he says, placing their finger on the map they've got spread out on the ground. "In which case, we need to go that way, and circle back round to here."

"No," disagreed Dean, taking control of their finger. "We were fine until here." He points to a different spot on the map. "So we're here now, and have to go that way."

Sam sighs, and starts running back through the route they'd taken in his head. _We went left at the start, then came through that big cave with the rock shaped like a penguin, then it was down that passage that Dean banged our head in, when I took over the walking, then two little caves, and round the pool of water, where we went right..._

"Left," interrupted Dean. "We went left at the water."

Sam looks back down at the map and frowns. Left? "I'm sure it was right."

"It was left!" insists Dean, clearly settling in for the long-haul on this argument.

Sam's about to retort when another voice echoes down the tunnel behind them. "Hellooo? Is somebody there?"

They've got their hand on the shotgun in their duffle bag so fast that neither of them is sure who moved it, or even if it moved itself out of instinct. "Hello," Sam shouts back, warily.

Several voices speak then, too quietly for Sam and Dean to understand what they're saying, but loud enough for the echoes to bounce around the caves.

"Hang on," the original voice yells after a minute. "We'll be right with you."

 _Don't sound like the ghosts of miners_ , thinks Sam.

 _No,_ agrees Dean, but neither of them relax their grip on the shotgun. Sam makes sure that it's out of sight in the bag, and Dean checks it's ready to be pulled out without snagging on something in the same quick glance.

Three figures come around the corner a few moments later, their headlights lighting up the whole tunnel and momentarily blinding Sam and Dean. They're dressed in shapeless boilersuits and hard hats, and are so slung about with ropes and other equipment that it's hard to tell anything about their physical appearance. They don't look like spirits or any other kind of creature though, and Sam lets their grip on the shotgun relax, although they don't let go of it completely.

"Afternoon," says Dean, as if they're meeting somewhere normal, like a shopping mall.

"Oh my god," says one of them, and her voice gives her away as a girl. "Sam Winchester! What the hell are you doing here?"

 _Fuck,_ flashes through their mind, and Sam's pretty sure they both thought it at the same time.

She comes closer, and Sam squints at her, trying to make out enough details of her physical appearance in the dark of the cave to tell who she is. Dean settles back in their mind, letting Sam take the lead - they both know that if she knows Sam, then having Dean talk and move will only confuse her, but he's not gracious about it.

"Jesus," she says, "I haven't seen you for four years, and I run into you in a cave!"

Her voice - high, excited, and with the edge of a valley girl accent - plays on Sam's mind, and suddenly he knows who she is.

"Katie?" he asks incredulously, and a rush of memories flash through his mind.

_Picking Jess up from her dorm room for their first date, and a dark-haired girl grinning at him from inside. "You better treat her right, or I'll hunt you down."_

_Playing frisbee on the quad with all Jess's friends, when Katie managed to get it stuck in a tree and somehow Sam was the one who had to climb up and get it back._

_Coming back from work to his and Jess's new apartment to find both her and Katie surrounded by chocolate wrappers and sniffing over some crappy chick flick._

_The way Katie's black dress had made her skin like whiter than paper at Jessica's funeral._

_Jessica's roommate_ , sums up Dean, but Sam knows he's seen that they were closer than that implies.

"What the hell are you doing here?" she asks again. "Last I heard, you were on a road trip with your brother, but no one's heard from you in years."

Sam shrugs. "I guess I'm still road tripping," he says, because he's sure as hell not going to go into any details about his life.

"In a cave?" asks one of the other cavers, and Dean takes control so that he can give them a careful look over, as if Sam isn't capable of eyeing someone up. They're both men, one taller and solidly built with a scruffy ginger beard, the other shorter with black-rimmed glasses. They're both looking at the Winchesters as if they're insane, and Sam wonders how much of their earlier argument they overheard.

"Well, if you want to see all of America, that includes the bits under the surface," says Sam. He's too surprised by the sight of Katie to try and think of a better excuse, and it's not like he could pull a con anyway, not with Katie standing right there and knowing too much about him. _Doesn't know about this,_ slips through Dean's mind, but Sam ignores it.

"In a leather jacket and jeans?" asks the same guy, the tall one. "You don't even have a helmet." His disapproval hangs heavy in the air.

"And mess up my awesome hair?" says Dean in mock-surprise, before Sam can stop him. He wonders if the sarcasm is as obvious to everyone else as it is to him. "Look," he says, picking up their bag, "You guys should really get out of here. It's not safe."

The guy in glasses scoffs. "No offence, dude, but we're all experienced cavers." He looks them up and down, clearly implying that they were not.

Dean clenches their fists in annoyance. "No offence, _dude_ , but five people have died in here in the last two weeks."

That gets their attention. "What?" gasps Katie, then she turns to glare at the glasses guy. "You said it was safe, Pete!"

"It is safe," insists Pete.

Before Katie can yell at him the way she's clearly dying to, Dean whirls their body around, and glares off down a dark hole. "Something moved," he explains tersely, one hand going back to the duffle again.

"We need to get out of here," says Sam. "Right now." Something moves in the hole again, and this time Sam sees it as well, a dark shape darting from behind a rock.

 _That's not a spirit,_ he points out, and Dean agrees.

_Get the civilians out, then we'll come back and waste whatever the fuck it is._

"Maybe it's another lost caver," suggests John.

"Unlikely," says Sam, keeping their eyes on the hole. There's a shocked gasp from Katie behind them, and they swing round to see her staring in horror at a small, dark figure with a long nose and a malicious gleam in its eyes.

"Fuck," swears Dean. They yank the first gun that comes to hand out of the duffle, but the troll has already disappeared.

"What the hell was that?" asks Katie.

"Troll," explains Sam quickly. "We need to get out of here fast, before its friends turn up."

It's too late though, even as he's saying that. There's a crash from somewhere above them and a shower of small rocks falls from the ceiling.

"Move!" yells Dean, and Sam takes control of their body to grab Katie by the waist and pull her back, out of the way, as the ceiling of the tunnel starts to collapse in. For a split second, he thinks this is it, that they're going to die buried under a hundred feet of rock and in a moment they'll be finding out if Dean's still down to go to Hell or not. The clatter of falling rock is so loud he can barely hear Dean think over it, a sudden panicked _please, not yet,_ then they throw themself and Katie as far away from the rockfall as they can. Something heavy lands on their right shoulder, and Sam thinks one of them swears out loud, then hands are catching hold of their arms, pulling them further down the tunnel.

The roar of the roof collapse dies away to a patter of stones, and they can hear harsh breathing in the silence it leaves behind. They check around the three cavers, who all look terrified but physically okay. Katie is staring at them with open-mouthed shock, and Sam wants to say something reassuring to her, but he can't think of anything. Dean ignores her and concentrates on running a quick check on their own injuries.

Their shoulder is burning with pain, and Sam clenches their teeth and presses their hand against their shoulder, feeling the distinctive shape of a dislocated shoulder beneath the leather jacket that Dean insisted was saved when they threw out most of his wardrobe, even though it cuts in tight around the armpits on Sam's body.

"Goddamn motherfucking bastard bitchfuck," swears Dean, and Sam has to agree.

"What the hell was that?" asks the bearded guy in a shocked voice.

"That was trolls collapsing the cave roof," says Sam, biting their cheek against the pain. "Good news is, they weren't trying to kill us, or we'd already be dead. Bad news is that means they want to play games with us before they do kill us." They crouch down on the rough floor of the cave, trying to swallow a choked whimper when the movement jogs their arm.

"Are you okay?" asks Pete, crouching down beside them.

"We're just peachy," grits out Dean. "Deep breaths," he says to Sam, and Sam nods, trying to take the brunt of the pain so that Dean can function enough to put it right. When he yanks on their arm, wrenching it back into its socket, Sam can't keep them from letting out a grunt of pain.

"Pussy," Dean calls him, and Sam narrows their eyes.

"Jerk," he responds, still holding tightly to their shoulder.

"It's okay, we're fine," says Dean to the others, who are all looking pretty freaked out, "and we're all going to get out okay. Take more than Rumpelstiltskin and his friends to take us out." The cavers fail to look reassured, and Sam takes control of their face, trying to look capable and calm.

“We need to get out of here,” he says, pulling their map of the cave system out of their bag with their uninjured arm, and ignoring the stab of pain when he jogs their shoulder. “There has to be another way out.”

Pete looks down at the map, shining his headlamp on it. “We're here,” he says, putting his finger on a tunnel that's miles from where both Sam and Dean had thought they were earlier. “If we loop round here, climb through this bit here, we should be able to make it back through to the main cavern, and get out.”

Sam grimaces slightly. The route is far longer than he's happy about taking with a bunch of civilians while they're being attacked by trolls, but it doesn't look like they have a choice.

 _We'll get them the hell out of here,_ thinks Dean, _then come back and waste the fuckers. Least we know it's not spirits now – no digging for corpses._

 _No, just loads of clambering about in caves with a dislocated shoulder,_ points out Sam.

There's a flash of _always finds something to complain about_ that Sam thinks he's not meant to notice, then _We should arm them._

Sam purses their lips. Dean's right, but he hates getting civilians involved in hunting. He just wants them away from here and safe, especially Katie. Seeing her again is bringing back all kinds of memories of Stanford that he thought were long buried. He scowls, and opens their duffle.

“Any of you know how to handle a gun?” he asks.

“These guys are tough fuckers,” adds Dean, “But they can be taken out by bullets just like a person.”

Katie is looking really freaked out now. “Jesus, Sam,” she says. “What happened to you?”

“Nothing,” says Dean sharply. Sam mentally tells him to shut up.

“This is what I do now,” he tells her, remembering to use a singular pronoun at the last minute. “It's sort of the family business.”

“Killing trolls?” she asks incredulously.

Sam shrugs and pulls out Dean's favourite handgun from the bag, then tucks it into their waistband. “Trolls, ghosts, demons...all kinds of evil,” he says.

Katie looks a little horrified. “Jesus,” she breaths.

Sam feels a prickly feeling creep down his spine. _Another person who'll never think of me as normal again,_ he thinks wistfully.

Dean snorts in their head. “Come on,” he says out loud, “at least one of you has to know how to use a gun.”

“My uncle took me to the range a couple of times,” ventures the bearded guy.

“Awesome,” says Dean, handing him one of their other guns. “It's just the same, except the target will be trying to kill you.”

The guy takes the gun gingerly. “Great,” he says weakly.

Dean gives him a big grin, slaps his back, then slings their duffle over their uninjured shoulder. “Let's get this show on the road,” he says, and sets off down the tunnel.

“Uh, it's the other way,” says Pete.

Sam wrestles control from Dean and turns them around in the right direction. “Right,” he says, lamely. “Just...testing.”

Pete looks disbelieving.

 

****

 

It's a long way through the caves to the main cavern where the exit is, and they have to clamber over rocks and crawl through several tight holes. Sam wishes that they'd thought to put some painkillers in the bag, and Dean calls him a pansy.

 _Besides,_ he points out, _painkillers would take our edge off. We don't want to be less than a hundred percent when there's a risk of being attacked by trolls._

They're both keeping an eye out for any signs of movement in the shadows, well aware that trolls aren't going to let them just walk out of their home territory unharmed, but the group reach the main cavern without any sign of them.

“Okay,” says Pete as the bearded guy, whose name turns out to be Stephen, pulls himself out of the crevice they'd crawled through, “From here it's just straight up there and out.”

Sam and Dean glance up where Pete gestures. It's a steep path out, surrounded by several rock formations, and far too many dark shadows which trolls could be crouching in, just waiting for them. Not for the first time, Sam wishes there was more light than the three cavers' headlamps and the Winchesters' flashlight.

 _Or less,_ thinks Dean. _Trolls will see us coming a mile off._

 _They know we're here already,_ Sam reminds him. _They'd be able to hear us anyway – you know they have amazing hearing._

Dean mentally acknowledges that with a resigned, _only a matter of time before they attack._

“If they're going to attack, this is where they'll do it,” they say out loud. “Everyone keep an eye out – yell if you see anything move.”

The others nod tersely, Katie still looking a second away from falling apart, and Stephen trying to keep the gun from trembling in his hand.

Sam and Dean take the lead. “If I yell run, you all head straight for the exit, fast as you can,” says Dean. “Get outside and away from the entrance before you stop – they won't go outside the cave.”

“What about you?” asks Katie, her voice wobbling slightly.

Dean flashes her a grin. “Nothing I can't handle, sweetheart.”

Sam sighs long-sufferingly. _Nice keeping a low profile,_ he bitches. _I've never called anyone 'sweetheart' in my life._

Dean ignores both him and Katie's shocked look, and lets Sam take control as they carefully climb up the slope out. Sam keeps his attention on not tripping or skidding on the loose rocks that cover the floor, and lets Dean take charge of keeping an eye out for the trolls. Pete and Katie follow close behind, and Stephen brings up the rear, gun still held tightly in his hand.

 _Is there something crouched by that stalactite?_ thinks Dean.

 _It's a stalagmite,_ Sam corrects without thinking, squinting at the shadow and trying to see if there's a troll hidden in it.

 _Such a geek_ , Dean thinks distantly, then the shadow moves and it _is_ a troll, leaping forward to grin at them. It's not alone either – trolls appear from behind every rock big enough to hide them and crawl out of tiny crevices in the walls.

 _Shitshitshit_ , they think, and bring their gun up to aim at the closest one.

“Invade our home,” accuses one of the trolls.

“We didn't mean to,” says Sam. “You let us leave, and we'll make sure no one else ever comes down here.” _Waste of time_ , thinks Dean. Sam ignores him.

“Kill you all,” says another troll angrily.

“Sam...” whispers Katie from behind them, sounding scared.

“We didn't know you were here,” says Sam, trying again. “You kill us now, and there'll be no one to tell other people not to come down here.”

The trolls think about that for a long moment. Just as Sam's beginning to hope it might just be that easy, the first one speaks again. “No,” he says decisively. “Kill you, kill others.”

They fire at him as all the trolls start moving forward as a pack, and the shot knocks him back behind his stalagmite.

“Now's the time to run,” yells Dean. “Get out as fast as you can, don't look back.” They fire again at the next nearest troll, mentally counting trolls and bullets and coming up with a bad answer. There's a shot from behind them – Stephen. It goes wide, and they hear him swear quietly, but he fires again as they do, and two trolls go down.

Pete and Katie hustle past them, through the gap that Sam and Dean are making in the crowd of trolls, heading for the exit. A troll picks up a rock and makes to throw it at them, but Sam and Dean shoot him before he can, and the rock falls from his lifeless hand as he falls to the ground.

Other trolls are picking up rocks, though, and soon Katie and Pete are running through a hail of them.

“Go!” Sam yells at Stephen, who's still behind them, helping them pick off the trolls who get too close to Katie and Pete.

“You'll never get out alone,” exclaims Stephen.

“We'll be fine,” says Dean. “You get out, get them outside the cave. We'll be right behind you.”

“Jesus,” says Stephen in a low voice, then he shoots three more shots in rapid succession and starts running. “Come on, guys,” he yells to the others, who have slowed under the barrage of rocks. One of them hits Katie's back, and she cries out. Sam grits their teeth and tries to ignore it.

 _We're running out of bullets,_ points out Dean, who's been grimly counting. They have more clips in their bag, but there's no way the trolls are going to give them time to reload.

“Run!” Sam yells at the others. Katie and Pete have nearly made it to the cave entrance, and Stephen's not far behind. _I have a plan,_ he tells Dean, needlessly because Dean knew it as soon as Sam thought of it.

 _It's a stupid plan,_ thinks Dean. Sam doesn't reply – he already knows that, just as he knows that Dean will go along with it anyway.

They pause their firing for a moment, eyeing the path to the exit and wondering just how fast they'll have to run to make it. _Too fast,_ thinks Dean. _We're not going to make it._

Sam's not so sure, but there's no time to debate it. Katie and Pete make it outside, and Stephen pauses in the doorway, hesitating, he turns back to them, raising his gun again.

“Come on!” he shouts.

They nod at him, take a deep breath, and fire their last remaining bullets up at the base of some of the biggest stalactites, right above the heads of the trolls. They start running before rock even starts falling, but they don't get far before the air is full of rock dust and falling stones. They throw the now empty and useless gun at the nearest troll as another troll leaps at them out of nowhere, roaring with anger, and nearly knocks them to the floor. They pull out their knife and hack at him desperately, still trying to keep moving, the troll burrows sharp teeth into their arm, then falls away as they slash the knife across his face.

 _Go, go, go, go, go,_ chants Dean, and they throw everything into getting through the clouds of dust and rock, and out of the cave. They can hear gunshots up ahead, and they see Stephen firing frantically just as a rock flies past their ear, whistling. They tuck their head down and move even faster.

“Get out!” yells Dean at Stephen, but he ignores them, taking out a troll before it can reach them. A rock hits their arm, jolting their already injured shoulder, and they swear loudly. Then they're at the entrance, and they grab Stephen, and push him outside in front of them, out into the sunshine where Pete and Katie are waiting.

They get twenty metres away from the entrance, and then stop, putting their hands on their knees and breathing deeply.

“Holy crap,” says Katie in a hushed voice.

Sam straightens up and gives her what he hopes is a reassuring look. “They won't follow us out here.”

She nods hesitantly, looking at him with wide eyes, and Sam tries not to think about all the ways he's changed since she knew him. He's suddenly conscious of the leather jacket, unlike anything he'd have worn at Stanford, the knife in their hand, still sticky with troll blood, and the bag over their shoulder, packed with weapons.

 _That's enough emo,_ thinks Dean abruptly, but Sam knows he's feeling guilty – as if it was his fault that Sam had ended up in this life.

 _I can't imagine living any other life,_ he thinks, but Dean ignores him.

“You guys got a car round here?” he asks the others, and Pete nods.

“Yeah, it's parked back down the trail,” he says, waving his hand in the direction of the tiny patch of gravel that serves as a parking lot for the caves.

Dean nods their head. “Mine too,” he says, not needing to stumble over the pronoun for once. They might jointly own everything now, but somehow the car is still wholly Dean's. “Let's get the hell out of here.”

The walk down to the cars is awkward. As if juggling a dislocated shoulder and a bag full of weapons isn't bad enough, they're uncomfortably aware of Katie's eyes on them, as if she's cataloguing all the differences the last few years have caused.

“What's going to happen to those things?” asks Pete.

They shrug. “Guess we'll have to go back later with better weapons and take them all out,” says Dean.

“Except they're not really a danger,” Sam points out. “So long as no one else goes in their territory, they'll not harm anyone.”

Dean thinks that's ridiculous. _How can we keep people from going down there? Too many crazy people who think crawling through rock is a good time._

“Their territory,” says Pete slowly. “The cave?” Sam nods. “I'm a geologist,” says Pete. “If I tell everyone the cave's on the verge of collapse, I should be able to get the government to close it off.”

They think that over. Sam's all for the idea of not having to go back down the cave – there were a lot more trolls than he was really happy with them tackling alone, and the idea of just letting them live in peace appeals to him. Dean is sceptical that closing the mine would really keep people away.

 _Like anyone really listens to the authorities,_ he grumbles.

“It's not very popular for cavers anyway,” adds Pete, and that decides Sam.

 _We'll keep an eye on it, and if it doesn't work, we can always come back,_ he cajoles Dean. Dean sighs and gives in. Neither of them are really that keen on killing an entire tribe of trolls just for living in the wrong place, anyway.

“Okay,” says Sam out loud. “We - I'll give you my cell number, so you can get in contact with us if something happens.”

“Can I have it as well?” asks Katie. “Before, you just disappeared, and then there was all this stuff on the news about you and your brother...I know the others will be glad to hear you're okay.” She says the last part almost as if it's a question, and Sam feels guilty that he just left all his Stanford friends to just worry.

“Sure,” he says. Katie smiles, relieved, and Sam senses part of Dean's mind starting to wonder how easy it would be to get her into bed. Sam points out that she was Jess's friend, and it'd be weird, and besides, it's unlikely their shoulder would be up for anything like that.

 _There's ways around a dislocated shoulder_ , grumbles Dean, but he lets it go. Sadly, not before Sam is treated to several mental flashes of Dean having sex with various injuries, and all the ways he'd found to get around them.

 

****

 

When they get down to the parking lot, Sam and Dean exchange contact information with Katie and Pete.

Katie hesitates for a moment as she takes his number, then says, “Sam, are you okay? Jess's death...”

Dean interrupts her before she can finish. “I'm fine.”

 _Let me answer,_ bitches Sam, irritated. “It's been a really rough few years,” he admits to Katie. “Not just Jess, but...my Dad died as well, and then my brother was...”

 _Tell her I'm dead and I'll sing the whole of Zeppelin IV on repeat all evening,_ promises Dean. Sam internally winces. He fucking hates Going To California.

“Well, it was a bit crazy,” he says to Katie. “This stuff,” he adds, gesturing back up towards the cave, “It can sometimes get a bit much. But I'm fine now, everything's better than it has been in ages.”

She doesn't look completely convinced, but there's not much more they can say to her. Sam gives her a reassuring smile, and gingerly hugs her before they go over to the Impala. They collapse into the driving seat and take a couple of deep breaths.

"Do you want me to drive you back?" asks Stephen hesitantly as Pete and Katie get into Pete's car.

"No," responds Dean automatically. Sam silently points out to him that they can't move their arm at all, and that the pain is seriously beginning to mess with their perception. Dean grunts, fixes Stephen with a glare and growls, "If you put so much as a scratch on her..." he lets their voice trail off ominously, and Sam scoots them over, into the passenger side so that Stephen can get in.

Stephen looks like he's regretting the offer as he settles behind the wheel.

"We're at the motel on Washington Avenue," Sam tells him and then, after a brief hesitation, "Thanks."

Stephen gives a one-shouldered shrug. "Least I can do. You saved our lives back there."

Sam leans their head against the passenger window, a position simultaneously familiar and strange. It's odd to have someone else driving the Impala again, and he can feel Dean's unsettled anxiety about it, but for a moment Sam just shuts their eyes and remembers what it used to be like to live his life in this seat. Dean only lets him get away with that for a moment before he opens them again, desperate to keep an eye on the road while there's a stranger driving.

When they get to the motel, Stephen hesitates for a moment, then hands them a card. "It's probably none of my business, but I really think she could help you."

The card reads:

Brenda Harcourt, psychologist.  
Specialist in personality disorders.

"You think we need a shrink?" asks Dean, incredulously.

"Um," says Stephen, "You keep referring to yourself as 'we'. And sometimes it seems like you're having a conversation with yourself."

Sam winces slightly. "It's not like that," he says. "It's not a split-personality or whatever."

Stephen shrugs, looking uncomfortable. "Maybe you should go see her anyway. I work with her, and she's really nice."

Sam over-rules all Dean's responses to that and just smiles instead. "Thanks," he says.

Stephen shrugs again. "No problem," he replies. "Thanks for saving our lives."

When he's gone, they go back to the motel room, dose up on painkillers, and fall sleep. The business card goes in the trash can when they wake up, but Sam can't help remembering it the next time someone they're rescuing gives them a confused and faintly concerned look.

 _Doesn't matter what anyone else thinks,_ Dean reminds him firmly. _No one can understand this except for us._

 _And we're the only ones that matter,_ adds another, quieter part of Dean's mind – the part Sam's meant to pretend he can't hear.

 _Yeah,_ he agrees, because it feels like that's always been true – so long as he and Dean are fine, and not crazy, what else matters?

 


	6. I Demand That We All Blend In

 

They slowly bleed together.

There's no 'mine' and 'yours' anymore. When they'd been in different bodies (and Sam was finding it increasingly hard to remember that - what had it been like to be alone in his head? Why didn't he remember being lonely?) they'd held hard to their own possessions - Dean's car, Sam's laptop, Dean's M&Ms - ownership clearly established for everything. Even the things they jointly owned didn't belong to both of them, but were assigned to a third person. Dad's journal, the motel's room. Mom's eyes.

Now everything belongs to both of them. Our car, our clothes, our laugh...our inability to decide how to take our coffee. ( _Black_ growls Dean, ignoring what their taste buds prefer. Sam rolls their eyes and orders a latte.) Even the things they'd been most possessive about become 'theirs'. Why should Sam get huffy if Dean uses the computer when he's right there, watching what Dean does on it and guiding him away from clicking anything likely to wipe the hard drive? How could it matter who owns the car, so long as Sam always lets Dean take control when it's time to drive somewhere?

Their mind starts out as divided territory, with carefully acknowledged mental lines between 'Sam's thoughts' and 'Dean's thoughts' - the only thing they have left that truly belongs to just one or the other of them. They hold on to the rigid boundaries with fierce tenacity, trying to keep a sense of self the only way they have left.

Over time, a third area grows between their minds, full of 'our thoughts' - the ones neither of them is sure who's thinking, or that they both think at the same time. Inevitably, the number of shared thoughts grow as their minds start to follow similar patterns, treading the same pathways because it's easier than pursuing separate ones.

They don't make compromises anymore - they don't need to. They're not sure if it's just that they're settled into a routine, or if they've blurred together so much that they don't need to discuss things anymore, and they don't really care. This is who they are, this is what they do, and there's nothing they could to do to fight it, even if they wanted to.

 

****

 

They live a lot longer than either of them thought they would. Dean has always had ideas of them going out in a blaze of glory, like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid only, you know, less criminals-on-the-run and more fighting-unspeakable-evil. They live long enough for Bobby to die and leave them his house and salvage yard. They're named in his will as 'Sam Dean,' and at some stage he's set up a full, mainly legal identity for them in that name.

After the funeral, which is attended by an awkward mix of hunters and locals, they stand in Bobby's front yard, and look at the house for a long moment.

 _Our own house,_ thinks Sam with a rush of emotion.

 _Such a girl,_ thinks Dean, but under that he's just as affected.

They keep almost all of Bobby's stuff. It's not as if they've got anything of their own to replace it with, and they both think the house would feel wrong without it. They keep hunting, but instead of resting up in motels in between cases, they go back to Bobby's where they take turns spending a day messing about with the cars still in the yard, then the next sorting through and organising all of Bobby's books.

Hunters aren't great at passing news on, and they often get calls on Bobby's old number for information. Somehow they end up falling into Bobby's old role as the go-to-guy for demons, and hunting less and less on their own.

 _Probably for the best,_ thinks Sam. _We are getting on a bit._

Dean scoffs at this. _Winchesters are never too old to hunt!_

 _We're still hunting,_ points out Sam, flicking through a book trying to remember where he'd seen a reference to the symbol Jo had emailed them about. _But this way we're not going to get torn apart by something because we're too slow, or because of our dodgy knee._

Dean sighs out loud, putting all his dissatisfaction at growing old into physical form. _It was in the green book, the one with the naked chick under a tree on the cover,_ he thinks sulkily, but they both know that if he really didn't agree with Sam, they wouldn't be sitting there reading.

 

****

 

When they do die, they're old enough for Sam's hair to be more grey than brown. It's a heart attack, striking them down suddenly in the kitchen as they make coffee, still arguing about how to take it even after all these years.

 _This is totally your fault_ , thinks Sam as the blinding pain surges through them, and they fall to their knees. _You and your damned cheeseburger obsession._ And then, suddenly, everything is different.

Sam's first realisation is how quiet is it, and he thinks that going deaf as well as having a heart attack is just not fair. Then he realises that the silence is in his mind; an absence of Dean's thoughts. He opens his eyes to see Dean staring at him. He's pale, and slightly translucent, but unmistakably Dean, looking as old as he was when they burnt his body.

“Holy crap,” Sam says.

“Yeah,” agrees Dean in a stunned tone. He looks down at their body, crumpled on the floor. Or is it just Sam's body again now? “Guess we're dead then.”

Sam can't take his eyes off his brother's face, a sight he hasn't seen in over thirty years. “Holy _crap_ ,” he says again.

Dean rolls his eyes. “No shit.” When Sam continues to stare, he shifts self-consciously. “Well, am I as stunningly handsome as I used to be?”

Sam frowns and considers the question. Dean's definitely Dean, but there's still something off about his appearance. “I'm sure you used to be shorter,” he says slowly. “And your hair's different – darker, maybe. There's something not quite right about your nose...”

Dean puts his hands up to his face, scowling, trying to feel the shape of his features.

“His inner image of who he is changed while he was in your body,” says a calm, high voice behind them. “Souls are malleable.”

A dark-haired girl is watching them from the corner of the room, leaning against the counter.

“Hey,” says Dean with a frown, “I know you.”

Not having Dean's memories flowing straight into Sam's mind is like suddenly finding his arm is missing, and Sam has to take a deep breath to settle the sudden panic that Dean knows something that he doesn't.

“You're the reaper who was after me after the car crash,” says Dean.

The girl nods. “We have unfinished business,” she says.

Before Sam can really process that – they're _dead_ and a _Reaper_ has come for them – a dark cloud that Sam instantly recognises as demonic flows up through the cracks in the floorboards and coalesces into a vaguely female figure with burning red eyes. Sam steps closer to Dean instinctively.

“My business comes first,” smirks the demon. “The soul of Dean Winchester belongs to Hell.”

“No!” growls Sam, moving even closer to Dean, and wondering what weapons a spirit can use against a demon. After all this time, he isn't going to let this happen.

“Sammy,” says Dean quietly, and Sam knows he's preparing himself for the worst.

“That's true,” says the Reaper to the demon. “Sam Winchester, though, is mine. You can only have Dean Winchester if you can take him without harming Sam's soul.” She stares right at Sam, then drops her eyes to his arm.

Sam follows her gaze, and sees that where he and Dean had instinctively moved close together to deal with the threat, their arms are now occupying the same space. They're blended together, and Sam suddenly realises that where they intersect, he can feel Dean's presence, like a ghost of what it had been like to have Dean inside his head.

“Dean,” he says in a low voice. Dean glances at their arms, then up at Sam with wide eyes.

“Sam,” he says warningly, but Sam ignores him.

“Brace yourself,” he advises, and then steps _into_ Dean.

It's like diving into warm water. He can feel all of Dean around him, the very essence of what makes him who he is soaking into the core of who Sam is.

 _Surprise, surprise, Sam pulls a dumb stunt,_ thinks Dean, and hearing his thoughts again is like coming home. Sam can't believe how much he missed it in only a few short minutes on his own.

 _Won't be dumb if it works,_ he thinks, just as the demon lets out a low growl of annoyance.

She stalks closer, and circles them, then reaches out to pull on a part of Dean's soul that's exposed, trying to wrench them apart. It hurts like Sam can't believe, a deep burning, tearing sensation, but he just grits his teeth and holds on with everything he has.

 _We've come too far for me to let go now,_ he thinks.

“Stop,” commands the Reaper. “You're damaging the soul of Sam Winchester.”

The demon lets go abruptly and turns angrily on her. “You'll regret this,” she spits. “You've no right to meddle in my business.”

“You have no power over me,” says the Reaper matter-of-factly, “and your kind meddled in my business first. Go back to the Pit, and leave these souls be.”

The demon growls something in an ancient language that sounds rude, and disappears back into smoke, sinking back through the floor.

“It worked,” says Sam blankly, unable to really believe it. He moves away from Dean, but makes sure to leave his arm in Dean's so as not to lose the feeling of having Dean with him completely.

“Thanks,” says Dean to the Reaper, and Sam can feel the echo of his relief sweeping through him.

“My pleasure,” says the Reaper, smiling. “Now it's time for you to let go.”

“Right,” says Dean uncertainly, then he brightens. “Hey, Sammy, you think we'll see Mom and Dad?”

Sam groans. “Dad's gonna be so pissed.”

Dean laughs, and the world glows slowly golden, until everything disappears in a bright light.

 


End file.
